Haunted
by Loudmouth Lamb
Summary: 10 years after the rebellion, Panem threatens to fall apart again and Gale is sent on impossible mission to reunite the districts. The task is easy compared to dealing with his new partner, a girl from his past, now a woman he doesn't know at all. While putting back together the broken pieces of a nation, can the two of them do the same for each other? "Rules of Survival" SEQUAL
1. The Ghost in the Room

"It was many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea,

that a maiden there lived whom you may know

by the name of…"

Edgar Allen Poe

Landing was brutal. Pearl thanked the pilot all the same before departing the hovercraft. She hated flying, the noise, the tedium. She hated being trapped in the air.

A man waited for her on the tarmac. He was a Capitolite. Even if she hadn't been expecting him, she would have sussed out that much with a glance. The purple silk vest peeking through his black jacket gave him away.

"Mr. Heavensbee, I presume," she said, offering her hand.

"Please do call me Plutarch," he said. She wasn't surprised when he kissed her hand instead of shaking it. The custom didn't bother her as much as it used to. "We're so happy you agreed to come," Plutarch continued. "I wouldn't imagine sending anyone else."

Pearl wasn't in the habit of acknowledging compliments. "I'll do what I can," she said, "for Panem."

"Well spoken," said Plutarch, smiling. There didn't appear to be anything particularly menacing about him. She remembered Annie's advice, however. _Don't trust him._ Easy enough. She wasn't in the habit of trusting people, either, no matter how harmless they appeared.

Pearl exchanged polite small talk with Heavensbee while admiring the scenery from the corners of her eyes. The mountains of District 2 had looked like brown ink smudges from the hovercraft; now she saw they were giants. No matter the mistakes she'd made, the ones she was sure to make, these mountains didn't care. They would not be changed by her and the thought was strangely comforting.

"I'm sorry you couldn't land closer to base," said Heavensbee. Pearl turned her eyes from the mountains.

"I understand," she said. Everyone knew that Paylor had commandeered the Nut, despite the damage done during the bombing. Plutarch had warned her that renovations were still in progress and almost half the base remained inaccessible. Regardless, the Nut was the safest place for the new government. Everyone was aware of its existence, very few knew how to find it.

After two hours of hairpin turns, Pearl was too dizzy to tell one mountain from another. She didn't see the steel door built into the rock until her face was less than a few inches away. "Impentrable," said Plutarch, rapping his fist against the door. "I should know, given how much time I wasted trying to find a way through. Only someone on the inside can enter the code."

Pearl assumed he'd sent ahead word of their arrival, as the steel door began rise into the rock. Heavensbee gestured her through. She peered into the gloom at a dimly lit corridor of steel beamed walls.

With no clue of what she was walking into, she stepped forward, entering the mountain.

* * *

The ambassador was late.

Gale looked to the clocks. There were four of them, one for each time zone, but he only cared about the time here, and everything else he could be doing with his own time rather than wasting it. _Ambassador,_ he thought, disgusted. Despite Paylor's attempts to explain to him exactly what an ambassador was supposed to be, he still didn't get it. She claimed that, traditionally, ambassadors were sent out to cement peaceful relations. Well, the only ambassadors he'd ever known were Capitolites, and they'd never shown an interest in peace.

"This ambassador…" said Gale. "Donner?"

Paylor looked at him through a holographic map of Panem's southern border. She waited for him to continue, only mildly exasperated.

"What do you really know about them?"

"Plutarch speaks highly of her," said Paylor, repeating what she'd already told him. "She's done well in the Capitol. Ridiculously well."

Gale flicked a piece of lint from his sleeve. A recommendation from Heavensbee wasn't all that reassuring. He didn't voice the thought aloud. Paylor would merely remind him that they had to work together, whether they liked each other or not. _Solidarity is key_ , he thought, lecturing himself for her. She wasn't entirely wrong.

After the rebellion, it didn't take long for the euphoria of victory to burn out. The Districts were bickering amongst themselves within a year. 7 was now threatening to secede. Everyone wanted something, no one wanted to give. Most of the Capitolites were too stupid, or too scared, to cause problems. Not all of them.

"You think this has a chance in hell of working?" said Gale. "That one woman can unite an entire nation?"

"Wouldn't be the first time," said Paylor.

Gale scowled at the four clocks. He'd worked with Paylor for a long time. She had learned how to shut him up. The faintest allusion to Katniss Everdeen had the power to silence him for days.

* * *

There wasn't enough time to shower, or even change, before her meeting with the president, so Pearl made do with splashing cold water over her face and smoothing down her wind-tossed curls. Her reflection was pale, fatigued. She believed in the power of a good first impression. When she smiled at herself, she didn't look quite so worn down. It would have to do.

Plutarch had assigned a private to accompany her. She found him waiting in the corridor, leaning against the wall. He snapped to attention as soon as she appeared.

"Ma'am," he said, saluting her. He was awfully young and eager. She was tempted to point out that she was not military personnel, therefore it wasn't appropriate to salute her, but she just smiled.

The Nut was not what Pearl expected. She asked questions as they walked and took in the damage. Even the sections that had been repaired were in poor shape. The lights were weak and flickery. Then suddenly, they were cast into utter darkness.

"Don't worry," said the private. He turned on his flashlight and kept going without pause. "Happens all the time. They'll come back on soon. There isn't enough power to keep everything running all the time. Always have a flashlight on you while you're here. My first week I got stuck in a blackout on level 4. Trust me, it's not fun."

"How long have you been here?" said Pearl, trying not to think about the dark, the tons of earth and rock bearing down on them.

"About a year." He puffed out his skinny chest with pride. "Enlisted as soon as I turned seventeen."

Oh yes, he was young. Did he even remember the rebellion?

"And the president, what's she like?" said Pearl.

"Well, I've never talked to her one on one," the boy admitted.

 _Helpful_. She had never met the president, not one on one, and not in a group. Though she knew a good bit about the woman. She'd watched all of Paylor's speeches. Onscreen, the president was concise, unflappable, more iron than woman. She was also fair.

They turned the corner onto a lit corridor and the private clicked off his flashlight. Time to focus now. Pearl set aside the persona she'd adopted for the Capitolites and searched for another better suited to a woman like Paylor. _No flowery small talk, no sugary smile._ Those tactics were useless here. She would have to act more like a soldier.

"Here it is," said the Private. "Command." He held up his wrist communicator to the black screen by the door. A green light flashed, all clear, and the door slid sideways without a sound. The private saluted her one last time before the door closed on him.

Pearl faced the circular room. Paylor sat directly across from her, a holographic map between them. "Welcome," she said. Her voice was warmer in person than on television.

"Sorry I'm late," said Pearl. "Weather delay on the hovercraft."

Paylor smiled and her whole face changed. Years melted away in a second. "Not a problem. Ms. Donner, before we get to it, I should introduce you to someone." Her eyes flicked to the left. Pearl followed her glance and noticed the man. He was standing so still, so quiet, he may as well have been part of the wall. His uniform matched the steel perfectly.

"This is Commander-"

"Hawthorne," said Pearl, finishing for the president. She stared, in disbelief, across a decade of lost time, at Gale Hawthorne.

* * *

"Good, you recognize him," said Paylor, unsurprised. He was the rebel hero, after all. Everyone in Panem knew his name, his face. Everyone thought they knew who he was. Paylor was still speaking, but all Gale heard was unintelligible static. There was only him and the ghost in the room.

He never thought he'd see her again, not when he was awake. She stole into his dreams sometimes, less now than before, but always in the back of his mind, sequestered with all the rest he'd tried to forget.

* * *

Composing herself quickly, Pearl held his gaze. When he finally opened his mouth to speak, she shook her head, a warning. He pressed his lips together again. His face was shock white, like he'd seen a ghost, and she supposed he had.

"Nice to meet you, Ms. _Donner_ ," he said.

"To business then," said Paylor, oblivious to the moment passing before her.

Pearl took an empty seat at the table. Gale remained by the wall. She felt his eyes drilling into the back of her head, but pretending not to, she focused on the president.

"Plutarch's sources report you've worked miracles in the Capitol," said Paylor. "You've converted some of our staunchest opponents. I'm impressed, Ms. Donner. If anyone can negotiate successfully with the Districts, I believe it's you."

"I hope so," said Pearl. She clasped her trembling hands under the table, waiting for Gale's voice to fall across the back of her neck.

"The travel arrangements are in order," Paylor continued. "I won't bore you with the details. I know you need rest. Plutarch will provide you with a full itenary, along with info-packs on each District, which just leaves us with the matter of security." She paused, her eyes once more flicking to Gale. "I've decided that Commander Hawthorne will accompany you.

Pearl dug her nails into her palms. "Excellent," she said.

* * *

Gale gaped at Paylor, his mind blown for the second time in half an hour, horrified by her declaration, and then furious. Why hadn't she informed him before the meeting? There'd been ample opportunity. Then again, he knew the answer even as he asked himself the question. She'd waited because she knew he wouldn't dare flaut her authority in the presence of the ambassador. Oh, but he was tempted. He was the rebel hero, not a damn babysitter.

Paylor arched her brows at him, daring him to complain. What choice did he have? Whether he agreed with the plan or not, and he didn't, not even a little, she was still his president, and arguing with her never got him anywhere other than where she wanted him to be.

He looked back to the ambassador's head. Her hair was darker than he remembered, dirty blonde instead of pure gold. The shock was too much. He couldn't think of anything to say other than his muttered consent.

* * *

Paylor's communicator beeped and she leapt to her feet. "Commander Hawthorne will show you to the mess hall," she said on her way out of the room, then she was gone, with no more of a goodbye than that. Pearl stayed frozen to her chair and stared straight ahead at the president's empty chair. Another decade seemed to go by while she waited for him to speak.

Then, finally,"You're supposed to be dead."

"I am," said Pearl. She didn't dare look at him now that they were alone. "Whoever you think I am, I'm not." There was so much more she needed to say, but her tongue knotted around all of the things she couldn't.

"You don't have to explain," said Gale. "I'll keep my mouth shut, if that's what you're worried about, Ms. _Donner._ "

Pearl kept staring at the empty chair as she listened to his footsteps recede. Long after he was gone, she still couldn't move, and it didn't make any sense. She should be satisfied. Her secret was safe and she hadn't been forced to confess to anything, or to lie.

Instead she felt...hollow.

All these years, he thought she'd died, and he didn't even care.

* * *

Gale contained himself until he reached his quarters. He deadbolted the door and then erupted, smashing anything he laid his hands on, even the cobwebs in the corners. Ten years. That's how long he'd been fighting to build a new life for himself, one that wasn't continually tainted by the past, and now a ghost threatened to bring it all crumbling down around him.

Only she wasn't a ghost. She was flesh, and blood, and she was here.

Exhausted, drained, he collapsed in the middle of the room and reached for the old book broken open nearby on the floor. The leather binding was cracked. The title was so faded it was unreadable, but he didn't need to see. He traced the indentations of the letters, spelling out _Romeo and Juliet_ with his fingertips.

The book was all he had left from home. It had rested buried and forgotten at the bottom of a trunk, untouched for years, and yet he felt he'd only just set it down. He wondered why he hadn't chucked it away with all the rest. After all, the book was never meant for him. It was supposed to have been a gift to a girl he used to know.

He launched the book at the wall. It slid to the floor and lay there, open in the middle, mocking him. _She's supposed to be dead._ He had gone to her house, the day the bombs dropped, and he'd seen the smoking rubble where the mayor's mansion once stood. No one could've survived.

Somehow, impossibly, Madge Undersee had done just that.

* * *

 **AN:** Here it is, 1st chp. to the 100% revised (a.k.a. totally different) sequel to "Rules of Survival". I've quite a few chapters on back-log, but I'm going to space them out (or at least try to), so that y'all don't have such a long wait in between. Buckle up, babes, here we go again.


	2. Where Are You From?

"The sea rocks have green moss. The pine rocks have red berries. I have memories of you."

Carl Sandburg

The next morning, Plutarch rode with them to the hoverpad. Sitting with him in the backseat of an antiquated jeep, so old Pearl wondered if they'd acquisitioned it from one of the Capitol museums, she glanced over the info-packs, reading by the narrow beam of a penlight. The sky was still black, slowly fading into gray, but any hint of sunlight was lost behind the mountains. Gale hadn't spoken all morning. Up front, he stared glumly through the windshield. When she'd tried to shake his hand, he had walked away. "Don't take it personally," Heavensbee advised.

It was personal, of course. She didn't care. Once, a long time ago, she would've been devastated, incensed by his behavior towards her, but she wasn't a lovesick teenager anymore. She was a woman on a mission. There was no room for the frivolous matters of a broken heart.

"You should find all you need to know in there," said Heavensbee.

"I'm certain," she said, doubtful. Working in the Capitol, she'd learned never to assume to know everything. Even after three years, the Capitolites found ways to surprise her.

"Of course you won't have any problems in 4," said Heavensbee. "I thought you might like to begin in your home district, a trial run of sorts. It's my understanding you haven't been able to visit in awhile."

Before Pearl could thank him, Gale whipped around. His face was mostly in shadow, just a thin strip of rosy light fell across his eyes. His dark brows rose. There was a droll quirk to his lips, easy to mistake for a smile, and her breath caught in her chest at the familiarity of that expression, so judgemental, all the more maddening for the subtlety of its arrogance.

"You're from District 4?" he said.

Pearl held his gaze. Her answer was firm. "Yes."

* * *

 _Explains the accent_ , thought Gale, turning back around. He'd noticed yesterday that she didn't smear her words the way people from 12 did, even the townies. So she'd renounced her home as well as her name.

But why District 4? She couldn't even swim.

Memories surged to the surface. The day in the woods, the day he took Madge Undersee fishing, a kiss that tasted of blood, his own. He scratched his nose, feeling a sudden tingle, the echo of pain, and he almost smiled, remembering how she'd been so eager to get her first kiss over with that she'd nearly broken his nose.

 _No, stop._ Gale forced down the memory, back where it belonged, buried. He had decided the best way to persevere through the next four months was to think of her as a stranger, the ambassador, nothing more. They had no past. She'd rewritten herself. So had he.

* * *

Pearl only pretended to listen to Heavensbee. She stared at the back of Gale's head, wishing she could carve a little peephole to see what he was thinking, but since she couldn't do that, she guessed.

The lake, the kiss. She never had learned to swim. So far no one had thrown into the ocean to test the validity of her story.

Then again, he might not be thinking anything. He might not remember that day. She felt a sharp pang in her abdomen, but it was better really, if he had forgotten. _We met yesterday,_ she told herself, and then forced her attention to Heavensbee once more.

* * *

Wind buffeted the small hovercraft wildly this way and that. Gale stole glimpses of the ambassador. He could've stared fixedly, unblinking, and she probably wouldn't notice. Clearly she did not enjoy flying. Her eyes were closed, jaw clenched, nails biting into her thighs. The craft plummeted and she rose out of her seat, nearly banging her head on the ceiling. As soon as they levelled, she began fumbling with her straps while still being flung about like a doll. Gale almost laughed. Then the craft dropped again. This time she did hit the ceiling, and though she didn't make a sound, her eyes teared at the pain. He took pity.

Gale reached over to tighten the straps across her waist and shoulders. She didn't slap him away. She kept her face forward, jaw still clenched, until his knuckles grazed her stomach and her whole body spasmed. He withdrew his hand, squeezed it between his legs, hoping to squash the tingly sensation. He scooted as far from her as possible, which wasn't very far, as they were cramped together in the frigid belly of the hovercraft. He winced every time their shoulders banged together and stopped stealing glances, trying instead to forget she was even there.

Whenever the craft plummeted, he hoped it wouldn't stop, and they kept falling, down and down, until they shattered against the earth, but the craft rose again every time.

* * *

As the hovercraft began to descend, Pearl squeezed her eyes shut and didn't open them until she was jarred by the thud of impact. Gale was already on his feet. He didn't attempt to help as she struggled to free herself from the seat restraints. He merely watched, hunched over in the small space, looking almost bored. The moment she unclipped the last buckle, he spun around and stepped out into the sunlight.

Pearl trailed after him. Her legs and feet were numb. As she carefully made her way down the ramp, the blood began to flow, bringing with it a sharp pain. She was almost to the end when someone called out her name and she looked up to find a fiery red comet streaking straight for her.

* * *

The red headed woman almost bowled Gale over as she ran past. Remembering his duty a moment too late, Gale grabbed at her, but she veered past. He pivoted, still reaching for the woman, and then froze, arm outstretched, hand clutching empty air, overcome by the ambassador's radiant smile. She looked sixteen years old again. She looked like more of a ghost than ever her face disappeared behind a red cloud.

Gale's arm dropped when he recognized the red headed woman. Still dumbfounded, he watched Annie Odair and the ambassador cling to each other as if they were sisters who'd been apart for a hundred years.

* * *

Annie clung to her for a long time. When they finally parted, she kept hold of Pearl's hands. Neither of them spoke. They wouldn't have been able to hear each other over the roar of the hovercraft engine or the cheering crowd gathered around the landing pad. Reluctantly, Pearl let go of Annie's hands when the mayor of District 4 broke free of the throng and approached.

Mayor Ridley wasn't a young man, but he was still fit as any twenty year old, with long arms bronzed from years in the sun. His beard was long, grizzled gray, as was his hair pulled back in a ponytail. Pearl held out her hand to him. He brushed it aside and embraced her. "Welcome home," he said, squeezing her to his wiry, muscled chest. She drank in the salty, brackish smell of him. Oh, how she'd missed this place.

Gazing at the crowd, Pearl recognized most of the smiling faces, and her heart overflowed. She hadn't been in 4 since leaving for the Capitol. Now she was finally home. But then she found Gale standing apart from everyone, painfully obvious in his gray military uniform against the colorful, loose flowing garments of the people. He squinted against the sunlight at the banner, with the words _welcome home,_ held aloft by two young women.

Suddenly, Pearl wanted to go to him. He reminded her so much of a lost child right then. She wanted to take his hand, lead him home, but she didn't know where home was for him, not anymore.

* * *

Gale marveled at how the people of District 4 cheered for the ambassador, blowing kisses, lining up to hug her. It was as if she really had been born here and he wondered if, maybe, she wasn't who he believed. Maybe she was simply Pearl Donner. Lost in thought, he didn't notice that Annie had joined him until she spoke. "Good to see you again."

"Yeah," he said, looking to her, "you too." She was no longer the bruised and wasted skeleton he remembered. Still she was too thin, fragile, like a flickering flame always on the verge of blowing out. They hadn't talked much, in District 13. The only conversation he recalled having with her was after the rebellion, at the ceremony to honor the fallen. Gale was the one who'd presented her with a Mockingjay medal for Finnick. _Your husband died to save us._ That's what he had said to her. She fainted before he finished.

Did she still have the medal or had she chucked it into the sea? That's what he would've done.

"You know her, don't you," said Annie, her voice lost in the crowd. Gale's eyes went wide and she chuckled. "I always suspected. She never mentioned you, of course, but anytime you were on the television, well…" She looked to the ambassador with a tender glow in her emerald eyes.

 _Well what?_ He waited for Annie to continue, but when she did, it was not where she'd left off. "Ridley knows, so do a few others, not many."

Gale nodded. He understood what she was telling him. Another warning to keep his mouth shut. There was so much he wanted to ask Annie, though, things he couldn't bring himself to ask the ambassador, but it was obvious she would say no more, and that was for the best.

He returned to watching the ambassador as she was swallowed up by the people of 4. Each time she hugged someone else, resentment thickened in his belly, hardening into concrete, until it was all he could do not to scream. There she was, laughing freely with these people who were not her real people, pretending that this place was her home.

* * *

Pearl was surprised to find her bedroom exactly as she'd left it. The window was open, the white curtains spinning in the breeze. She ran her hands over everything, the bookshelves built into the wall, with her books meticulously organized, the teal comforter, and the pale blue wallpaper patterned with conical designs. She perched on the bed and, one by one, picked up the seashells lined neatly on the nightstand. Some she had found. Most were gifts.

There was a soft knock at the door. "Come in," said Pearl. Annie entered, crossed the room, and smiling, picked up one of the shells.

"Davey kept up the collection for you," she said.

"I noticed," said Pearl. "Where is the sea monster, anyways?"

"The beach. He's learning to sail. I told him you wouldn't have enough time to go out with him while you're here, so he isn't thrilled with me right now."

Annie sat beside her and looked out the window. The Victor's Village, where they lived, consisted of thirty houses built around an inlet. From this side of the house, they couldn't see the ocean, but they heard waves crashing over the rocks. Pearl was struck by how much she'd missed the sound. The Capitol was so full of artificial noise. Nature was manufactured. Nothing was real.

"Ridley's put together a banquet for tonight," said Annie. Pearl groaned. She'd much rather spend the evening at home. "I could tell him you're too tired."

Pearl shook her head. It was her duty as ambassador to go. Besides, she knew Ridley must've gone to a great deal of trouble, and he'd done more than enough for her already. All of her old clothes were still hanging in the wardrobe. She chose a lilac wrap dress with a beaded hem that jingled with the slightest movement. Annie helped her with the ties. Even though she'd lived in District 4 almost six years, Pearl had never quite mastered the art of the wrap dresses so popular here. She never felt secure in them and a part of her, still today, feared the ties would come undone, leaving her naked and exposed.

"Leave your hair down," said Annie. She stood behind Pearl as she inspected herself in the mirror. "You might not get the chance again for awhile, Miss Ambassador."

Pearl swatted at her. True, though, that in the next four months she wasn't likely to find an opportunity to let her hair down, so tonight she would let loose, just a little. She could be herself, more so than anywhere else. Mayor Ridley didn't expect anything from her. He was already in full support of Paylor's government.

"I missed you," said Annie.

"I missed you too," said Pearl. "When this is over, I'm coming home."

"Maybe for a little while."

"No, for good," said Pearl, shaking her head. "I can't stay in the Capitol any longer."

Annie took her hand and squeezed. "You're always welcome," she said. There was something bittersweet about her smile now. It was as if she was keeping a secret.

"What?"

"Nothing," said Annie. "Just that you might find somewhere else you belong."

Pearl wriggled her fingers loose from Annie's grip. She turned back to her reflection. _You're wrong_ , she thought. This was home. Annie and Davey were her family. There was nothing else left for her in all the world.


	3. Little Mermaid

**AN:** I am trying so hard to pace these updates and it's so hard not to just post them all at once! Ugh. But anyways, thanks as always for reading.

* * *

"Even when I say you're wrong,

You only listen to the siren's song."

Bradley Lorneli

Annie showed Gale to his room before joining the ambassador upstairs. Not knowing what to do with himself, he stretched out across the bed. Now was a good time to catch up on the sleep he'd missed the night before. Only he couldn't get comfortable. The mattress was soft with no support whatsoever. He'd never slept in such a nice house. After the rebellion, he could've chosen a life like this, sleeping on clouds, with a mansion of his own, but a life of ease left too much time for regret.

He abandoned the idea of sleep. Wandering the empty hallways, eventually coming to the main parlor, he felt like a trespasser. Annie's tastes were simple. She'd traded out all of the Capitol-style furniture for local craftsmanship. The coffee table was made of driftwood, sanded smooth, unpainted.

Gale was drawn to the pictures on the fireplace mantel. He lingered on the one of Mags standing between Finnick and Annie, both of them hardly more than children, with her arms around them. Her eyes were so kind despite all she'd suffered. The Capitol had fallen, yet at times like these, the old rage simmered. Victory had come too late for Mags, for the Odairs, the Crestas, and so many others, too many.

Reaching the very last photo, Gale drew a sharp breath. Madge Undersee stared back at him, just as he remembered her. She was sitting in the sand with a little boy in her lap, both of them grinning at whoever took the picture, probably Annie. The boy was waving with one hand, while the other was tangled in Madge's frizzy gold curls. She couldn't be more than nineteen years old.

He wasn't aware of time or that he was reaching towards the photo, his fingertips almost, not quite, touching the glass. The pitter patter of feet racing down the hall startled him to his senses and his arm dropped just as a young boy burst into the room, the same boy from the photo, only no longer a toddler. There was no doubt who the child belonged to. He looked exactly like his father. The resemblance was nauseating.

"Who are you?" said the boy. He wasn't afraid to find a strange man in his house. His expression was curious, his feet bare and plastered with sand, and water dripped from the hem of his shorts onto the pinewood floor.

"Commander Hawthorne," said Gale. "I'm here with-"

The boy's eyes widened, taking up most of his face. "You fought with my dad!"

Around the lump in his throat, Gale managed to say, "I did." Looking at the boy was worse than looking at the pictures. He imagined Finnick at ten years old, before the reaping, before he'd been forced to kill.

Any second now, he expected the boy to start firing off questions, but after sizing Gale up, the boy merely said, "You look different on television. I thought you were bigger." Gale laughed. The boy crossed his arms. "What's so funny?"

Gale was laughing too hard to answer. He stopped abruptly as soon as the ambassador walked into the room. The boy forgot all about him. "Pearl!" he cried, flinging himself at her. She opened her arms to catch him, sandy clothes and all.

* * *

Davey babbled too fast for Pearl to keep up. He asked questions and then didn't give her time to answer. They spoke on the phone, never as often as either of them would like, never for long enough. He'd grown so much. Annie had sent a picture of him only a few months ago and already he'd sprouted another few inches. Soon he'd be as tall as her.

Together, she and Davey led the way along the pebbled path to the Victor's beach pavilion, where the banquet was to be held. Annie followed close behind them, while Gale fell further back the closer they came to the pavilion. Tables had been set up along the perimeter, leaving room in the middle for dancing later. White tablecloths fluttered. The whole district already seemed to be there.

Davey insisted on sitting next to Pearl, so Ridley graciously sacrificed his own seat and went off in search of another. There'd be time to talk to him later. For now, all she could think of was the magnificent spread of food before her. There were fresh vegetables, fresh fish, freshly baked bread. She couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten something that wasn't canned with a metallic aftertaste.

All of the food the Capitolites had kept hoarded to themselves had been acquisitioned and reallocated out to everyone in the city. Of course the Capitolites complained. They weren't a very neighborly bunch and they couldn't grasp why they should be expected to feed anyone dumb enough not to have built their own stockpile. Pearl was constantly reminding them that the alternative was starvation.

Panem's resources had been devastated during the rebellion. Plantations and arbors decimated, forests burned to the ground, infrastructure blown apart, and then there were the mines. Most of the outlying Districts relied on coal as a main source of power. The Capitol had never seen fit to provide them with more modern methods. District 12 had only begun producing coal again about a year ago. People all over the country were still living in a total blackout. There simply weren't enough resources to go around, and though Paylor did everything she could to ensure the Capitolites were treated fairly, she met opposition at every turn. The majority was in favor of letting the Capitolites fend for themselves or to round them all up before a firing squad.

So Pearl implemented the ration program. Plenty of Capitolites hated her for it. Every community garden she'd tried to create was torn up, vandalized, but she kept planting seeds, hoping that one day she could make them realize they were only hurting themselves. She listened to their complaints, their accusations, their whining, wishing she could scream back at them, while instead calmly explaining the situation, over and again, in terms a child could understand, because they were children. They knew how to do nothing for themselves, only how to take, yet she planted, and she listened, and she fought for them as much as against them, not so much out of sympathy, or even pity, but as a means to an end, to peace.

* * *

Gale prodded a spidery legged shrimp with his fork. None of the food was familiar to him and he wasn't in the mood to try something new. The past two days had been full of enough unpleasant surprises. He doubted the shrimp would be any different.

His eyes followed Ridley. The mayor didn't remain in one place for long. He carried his plate from table to table, person to person. Now he was sharing a drink with a trio of crusty, old fisherman. The men laughed raucously at something he said.

"He'll be telling them one of his dirty sailor jokes," said Annie.

Startled, Gale turned to her. Both she and the ambassador were watching him watching the mayor.

"The one about the mermaid?" said Davey.

"Mermaid?" said Gale, certain he'd never heard the word before. At the same time, scowling, Annie spoke, "Those jokes are not for children."

The boy ignored his mother. He looked at Gale, almost proud, knowing something that the rebel war hero didn't.

"Mermaids are pretty girls with fish tails," he said. "And they wear seashells over their-"

"Enough of that," said Annie. She nudged the boy out of his seat and shooed at him. "Go find

your friends."

Davey turned to the ambassador. "I'll be here," she assured him. A soft smile flickered across her lips as she watched him race across the pavilion to a group of children playing tag. _You're it_ , thought Gale, remembering when he used to play with his siblings.

"It's just a story," said the ambassador. She was looking at him now, still smiling, hesitantly. "There's no such thing as mermaids. Apparently sailors have a hard time telling the difference between a woman and a seal."

"Didn't know there was a difference," said Ridley, falling into the boy's empty seat. The ambassador rolled her eyes.

"And that's why you never married," she said. Ridley tossed back his head and laughed. The sound grated on Gale's nerves. He stabbed at a shrimp so viciously that it bounced off his plate and into Annie's lap.

"Sorry," he muttered, hoping Ridley and the ambassador hadn't noticed, but of course they had. There was a warning in those blue eyes, as if he was a misbehaving child, and any minute now she meant to send him away as Annie had done with her son.

"So," said Ridley, leaning across the ambassador for a better look at him, "I finally get to meet the big hero. You'll have to forgive me for not greeting you properly this afternoon. I was busy reeling in a mermaid."

The ambassador rolled her eyes again. "It's fine," said Gale brusquely, hands fisted under the table. He knew he was being rude. He knew it was uncalled for. Ridley had done nothing to him, except laugh with the ambassador. All the same, he couldn't bring himself to smile back at the man or say anything more to him.

People had begun to dance. Davey and his friends darted between them, oblivious to the hems they stepped on, and suddenly Gale longed to join them. He needed to run. He needed to be anywhere but here. The children were calling to each other, _tag you're it_ , and it didn't seem to him that they were merely playing a game anymore. Davey turned into Finnick, the pavilion became an arena, and Gale couldn't breathe.

* * *

"I swear I saw her," said Ridley. "I'll never forget the day. It was only my third real fishing trip, couldn't have been older than thirteen, and then there she was, the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."

Pearl glanced at Annie, who was snickering behind her hand. They'd both heard the story of Ridley's mermaid a million times and so had everyone else in District 4. She didn't believe a word of it. Fishermen were always telling stories, and he was the worst of the worst about it, but she listened anyways, every time.

"She had flaming red hair, eyes like the moon, and then when she leapt from the water, I saw that she had a-"

Gale leapt up so violently that his chair fell backwards and banged against the flagstone. For a moment, he just stood there, his fists trembling at his sides, and then he walked away without a word.

"Guess he didn't like my story," said Ridley.

* * *

Laughter and music from the party chased him down a deserted street. _Tag, you're it._ So did the ambassador. He heard her call his name, and her footsteps slapping the pavement, but he didn't stop, he didn't turn around, afraid of what he might do. There were times when he lost control. It was like a black cloud sweeping over him, darkening his vision, making it impossible to see what was real and what wasn't. He'd learned to recognize the warning signs, but he wasn't always able to push back the darkness. Sometimes it was just too strong. He was powerless. The only thing he could do now was to keep walking.

Even when she caught his arm, he didn't stop, only shook her off. She darted around him, planted herself firmly in his way, and he just barely restrained himself from shoving her aside. As they stared each other down in the twilight, his breath came in ragged gasps.

"It doesn't matter whether you're angry at me," she said. Her voice was cold, but her cheeks were flushed, burning in outrage. "That doesn't give you the right to make an ass of yourself, to treat them like this, when they've been nothing but welcoming to you."

Gale tried to step around her. She wasn't his damn keeper. He couldn't bare listening to her defend Ridley and everyone else from District 4, even if he knew, rationally, that she was right. The ambassador would not let him pass.

"And you've no right to be angry at me, either," she said. "I haven't done anything."

The storm burst. His fist struck the nearest thing that wasn't her, a street lamp, and a searing shock of pain reverberated up his arm, into his chest. He barely noticed. The ambassador didn't so much as flinch.

* * *

Gale moved to strike the lamp post again. Without thinking, without considering the possibility that he might hurt her, Pearl grabbed his arm. She held on tight, digging in her nails. It wasn't until she met his eyes that she felt a prickle of fear. He'd always had a temper. This was something else, something darker than she'd ever seen in him. She let go and took a step back.

* * *

The ambassador had gone pale with fright. _Good,_ he thought, darkly satisfied. "They died," he said. He meant to use the words as a weapon, an arrow straight to the heart, but they rang hollow. "They all died and you went on as if they never existed."

* * *

Pearl let him go. She couldn't have followed him even if she'd wanted to. Those horrible words wrapped themselves around her, squeezing the air from her lungs, crushing her. She stayed frozen in place even when Ridley emerged from the shadows. Right then, it didn't matter to her how long he'd been there, how much he'd overheard.

"You were friends," he said. It wasn't a question. Still numbed by Gale's words, she shook her head. They had never been friends. She didn't know how to explain to him their brief alliance. She was too afraid even to try. "He thought you died," said Ridley. She nodded.

Finally, she looked to him. He had taken her in, given her a place to start over. He had taught her how to tie knots, and though she wasn't much good at it, she practiced whenever the flashbacks became too vivid. She'd learned from him that making knots was easier than undoing them. "I don't know what to do," she said. "He'd rather I stayed dead."

Ridley drew her to him. She sagged in his arms, breaking down, just as she had so many times before after first coming to District 4. "My little mermaid," he said softly, "I forget sometimes how young you really are."


	4. In Remembrance

"You won't find a new country, won't find another shore.

This city will always pursue you."

C.P. Cavafy

Pearl woke on top of the covers wearing her clothes from the night before. Her legs were tangled in the tasseled skirt. Panicking, she thrashed free, then she lay spread eagle, panting, trembling. She reached blindly for one of the seashells on the nightstand and pressed the pad of her thumb against the scalloped edge. Pain helped to remind her of the present.

 _You're safe,_ she told herself, the same mantra every morning, _You're not in that place anymore. You never will be again._

* * *

"What was it like fighting in the rebellion?" said Davey. "Mum won't talk about it. Did you really take down a Capitol bomber with just an arrow?"

"Not _just_ an arrow," said Gale, choosing the easier question to answer. "It was special-made, explosive."

"Did you make it?" said Davey. His spoon was raised halfway to his lips and had been for the past ten minutes. A glob of oatmeal plopped wetly back into his bowl.

"No," said Gale. "Eat your breakfast."

Davey popped the spoon into his mouth, swallowed, and started up again. The boy was incorrigible. "Are you still friends with the Mockingjay? Because I really want to meet her someday."

Gale's hand jerked involuntarily. He quickly slid it under the table and gripped it with his other hand. The boy stared at him, so innocent, oblivious to the pain he inflicted with his curiosity. That was the worst part about children. Gale hadn't been around any for a long time and he'd forgotten how quick and deep they could cut you.

"Leave him alone," said Annie, coming into the room with Ridley. Gale rose from the table. He wasn't prepared to see the mayor again. He hadn't even combed his hair.

"I was out for my morning swim and thought I'd drop in," said Ridley. Sure enough, his ponytail was damp and frizzy. He wasn't wearing shoes. It seemed people in District 4 preferred going barefoot. "There's somewhere I want to show you."

Gale looked to Annie, somewhat panicked, as if she could tell him where Ridley meant to take him. What punishment did this man have in store? Annie smiled at him as she sat down beside her son. "Pearl's still asleep," she said. Absentmindedly, she ruffled Davey's hair. He jerked his head away. "Should I wake her?"

"Let the poor mermaid rest," said Ridley. He never took his eyes off of Gale. His expression was impossible to read. He had the face of the ocean, calm on the surface, so much stirring in the deep. "Give Commander Hawthorne and I a chance to talk, man to man."

Gale looked to Annie again. _Help_ , his eyes screamed. "Can I come?" said Davey.

"You're not a man quite yet," said Ridley, finally looking away from Gale to flash a crooked smile at the boy. Davey glared impetuously back at him. "We won't be gone long."

Gale tried to swallow around the lump in his throat. Grudgingly, he accepted there was no way out of going with Ridley without once again making an ass of himself.

For awhile, the two of them walked in silence. Gale didn't have a clue where the mayor was taking him. He waited for Ridley to tear into him, expecting the worst, but Ridley just whistled until they passed through the trident gates of the Victor's Village. Then he glanced at Gale with those oceanic eyes and said, "Well, what do you have to say for yourself, boy?"

No one had called him _boy_ in a very long time. His cheeks grew warm as he thought about his behavior the night before. He had acted like a child. He deserved to be treated like one now. "I don't have an excuse," he muttered.

"We both know that's not true," said Ridley. His words were gentle, his voice gravelly, and the contrast was oddly soothing. Gale risked looking again at the man and found that his expression wasn't hard to read at all now. The waters parted to reveal kindness and understanding and the pressure in Gale's chest eased.

"Come on," said Ridley. Only then did Gale realize they'd stopped walking just past the trident gates. "There's something you need to see."

No longer quite as apprehensive, Gale fell into step beside him.

* * *

Pearl found Annie sipping coffee on the lanai. She yawned as she sat down. Annie filled a cup for her and pushed it across the table. "Trouble sleeping?" she said. Pearl nodded. She blew on the hot coffee. Sunlight sparkled and danced across the calm surface of the ocean. There would probably be a storm in the afternoon. There usually was on days that started out so peacefully.

"Do you want to talk about it?" said Annie.

Pearl circled her pinky around the rim of her cup. She didn't want to think about last night, let alone talk about it. When she didn't say anything for a minute, Annie understood. She didn't press.

"He's with Ridley now," she said. "They left about an hour ago."

Pearl straightened up in her chair as if she'd been electrocuted. "Why didn't you wake me?" she said. She didn't wait for an answer before leaping to her feet. Ridley and Gale alone together would only end in disaster. She had to go after them. Someone had to keep Gale in check. Then she remembered the look in his eyes last night and wondered if she was even capable. He wasn't a boy anymore. Something had changed in him. She stayed where she was, hesitant to go after them now. She had tried so hard to convince herself that she could manage him. After last night, though, she doubted herself as she hadn't in years.

Pearl was afraid of him. She was afraid of how he made her feel. He knew too much and he was angry enough to use it against her. It would be so easy for him to destroy the life she'd made.

"They'll be fine," said Annie. "Ridley can handle anyone."

Pearl shifted where she stood, still torn. Whatever side she'd seen of Gale last night was feral, savage, all tooth and claw, lusting to rip, tear, and mutilate. Could Ridley, could anyone, handle such monstrous rage?

"Where did they go?" said Pearl.

"Ridley didn't say."

But they both knew. _The monument,_ thought Pearl, falling back into her chair, feeling lightheaded. She couldn't go there. Not today, not with Gale's words still echoing in her very bones. _They all died and you kept going like they never existed._ She couldn't deny it, not to him and never fully to herself, and that was the worst part. She couldn't explain without making him hate her even more.

* * *

Gale eyed the little, wooden boat bobbing by the pier.

"All aboard," said Ridley, already seated in the prow.

The boat didn't look sturdy enough to hold the both of them. Gale looked out across the ocean. A rainbow of sails dotted the blue horizon. The water was calm enough. But he couldn't get into the boat. He knew how to swim, only he didn't trust the ocean. It was just so...big. He imagined drifting with no shore in sight, swept away by the sea, lost forever.

"I'll get you back to land, Commander Hawthorne," said Ridley. Gale's face grew hot again. Something about this man made him feel like a child. He couldn't quite say what.

It was ridiculous, being so afraid of getting into a boat, considering everything else he'd done. What must Ridley think of him, the rebel hero quaking in his boots on the dock. _Pathetic._ Gale scrambled down into the boat, biting his lip as it rocked beneath his feet. He plopped down on the bench opposite Ridley and gripped the sides.

"See, it's not so bad," said Ridley as they pulled away from the dock. Gale disagreed. He kept his mouth shut. He wanted to close his eyes, too, but he felt the mayor watching him even with his face turned away to the sea. Salt stung his lips. He was grateful that Ridley didn't strike up a conversation, because he felt sick; and it wasn't the rocking of the waves that churned his stomach, but the emptiness they were sailing into. Just looking at it, the ocean slipping seamlessly into the horizon, Gale felt himself going mad.

To steady himself, he focused on a black shape rising starkly against the infinite blue. He thought it was a strange rock, but as they drew near, he realized it was some sort of monument built on a flat rock jutting from the ocean. The little rowboat bumped against the rock and Gale found himself staring up at a twelve foot pickaxe. As soon as Ridley finished securing the boat, he scrambled out onto the rock. His boots slid over the slick, mossy surface. He nearly skidded right into the monument.

His face less than an inch away, his own reflection staring back at him in the black, Gale saw the names. They were etched into the stone, so delicately, with such care. He couldn't imagine how long it must've taken to chisel 7,200.

"All of them?" he said.

"All of them," said Ridley, close behind. Gale's eyes dipped from the names to the inscription carved into the base of the monument. _For District 12, go freely, and we will remember you._ His eyes rose, reading name after name, until he came to three clustered together. He couldn't stop himself from touching the black marble to trace each letter.

 _Wallace Undersee._ He had never known the mayor's first name. Strange seeing it now and connecting it to the man he vaguely remembered. His fingertips swept down to the next name. _Marilyn Undersee._ The mayor's wife. An image broke across his mind of a pale woman in a white dressing gown, holding a fire poker over her head, madness in her eyes. He moved on quickly and wished he hadn't.

There she was, right below her parents. He covered her name with his palm, expecting it to be gone when he moved his hand, but it was still there, etched in stone. _Margaret Undersee._

"It's her design," said Ridley.

Gale stepped back to look at the monument as a whole. She'd chosen well.

"She used to come out here every day," said Ridley. "She'd read the names from dawn till dusk."

Gale couldn't stop staring at her name. It was so terribly wrong. He understood suddenly why. This wasn't a monument. This was a gravestone and her name didn't belong. He didn't want it to be there.

"She never forgot them," said Ridley, too close, but Gale didn't have the strength to draw away, not even when the mayor laid a hand on his shoulder. "Or you."

He tore his gaze from Madge's name and looked into Ridley's oceanic eyes. "Let's go back," he said after a long minute. There was something he needed to do, someone he needed to see. As Ridley rowed them to shore, Gale wasn't afraid of capsizing. He felt the pickaxe looming, falling further and further behind, but he didn't once glance back, only forward.

Whatever had happened to her, whoever she was now, it didn't matter.

He wondered if she read her own name with the others?

* * *

" _I've always wanted to go to District 4," Gale blurted. "See the ocean. Can you imagine that much water?"_

 _Madge turned her head to him. Light and shadow danced across her face. "12 has a coastline," she said._

" _It's fenced off," said Gale._

 _She stopped walking, glanced around at the trees. A mockingjay swooped over their heads. Her eyes followed the bird until it vanished into the leafy canopy above, and then she looked back to him. "Since when has that stopped you?" she said. She started walking again. Gale lingered behind her for a moment. She was so small compared to the trees. Without him, she'd be lost in a heartbeat, and suddenly he was afraid of losing her. His ally, his friend._

 _Gale hurried to catch up to her. Someday, he thought, they would see the ocean together. Someday they would be able to go anywhere they liked. Nothing would be fenced off to them. The whole world would be open._

* * *

Her feet kept sinking deeper in the sand and she couldn't fight. She let it happen. Disappearing was almost too easy. All she had to do was stand still. Let nature take care of the rest. Let the wind chip away at her until she was a grain of sand, when perhaps once she'd been a mountain.

Pearl didn't need to look over her shoulder to know that Gale was standing behind her. He didn't make a sound. She felt him, his fears and uncertainties, all tangled up with her own. The waves broke in a violent froth around her ankles.

"I saw the pictures," she said, unsure whether she was speaking to Gale or to the ocean. There wasn't much difference between them. Both were a mystery to her. "I couldn't stop looking at them. I still look at them in nightmares, trying to find people I recognize, but…"

She couldn't say it. Her tongue turned to ash.

* * *

But there was nothing left to recognize. Gale hadn't needed to look at pictures. He had walked through the wreckage. He had turned over body after body, searching for familiar faces, and finding the same charred mask every time.

"Nine hundred and fifteen," she said. "You saved as many as you could. More than anyone could've expected."

She looked so small against the ocean. She'd been lost for so many years. The tide could carry her off at any moment. "I didn't save you," said Gale. It was the only net he had to cast, the only one that might catch her and keep her from slipping away again "I tried. I went to your house, when I came back, after I got my family out. I went to your house first. There was nothing left."

He held his breath, waiting, his words thrown back at him by the pitiless wind. It wasn't an apology, just the truth, cold and desperate. What he should've said, _don't go, don't leave me,_ was more of a feeling than a request, so he didn't know how to put it into words.

The ambassador turned to him.

* * *

For a moment, Gale held her gaze, and then his eyes drooped. A moment was long enough to see what she needed to know. He blamed himself. He'd been carrying her ghost around all these years.

 _And I let him_ , she thought, wishing she could explain. Nothing about that day was his fault. She hadn't even been in the house. She was long gone by then. "Back at the Nut, when I tried to explain," she finally said. "Do you really not want to know?"

Gale shrugged. "Figured you wouldn't tell me the truth, whether I wanted to know or not."

"No, I wouldn't."

"And you still won't?"

Pearl sighed. He deserved to know. Ten years was enough time spent blaming himself for her death. Only she couldn't bare the thought of his blame turning against her instead. "You can ask anything you want," she said. "I might not always answer, but I won't lie. I promise."

* * *

Gale wasn't sure how much he wanted to know. Questions were as dangerous as answers and they gave as much away. He noticed that she breathed in sync with the tide, the air rushing in and out of her lungs, alive. There were so many things to ask. He couldn't think of a single one at the moment, so he simply nodded, accepting her terms.

 _They're have to be rules_ , he thought, turning his gaze seaward. Every alliance had rules. He couldn't pretend she was a stranger, but he was happy to tread carefully through the ten year tangle between them. There was no rush. The tour would last four months. They had until then, at least.

"Is it like you imagined?" she said, gesturing to the ocean, opening up her arms as if to catch the waves.

"No," he said, looking at her and not the ocean. "Nothing's like how I imagined."


	5. Where Do You Go?

**AN:** As always, thanks for reading & reviewing :) Not much happens in this chapter, sorry, mostly just Pearl & Gale further adjusting to one another.

 **NurseKelly:** Sorry I didn't reply to your message. Totally forgot, but I am working on a new chapter for "It's Complicated" at the moment. I hope to have it up sometime soon!

* * *

"Where is your body when you are in your dream,

Is everything really what it seems?"

-Unknown

Davey was hiding in the pirate ship. It wasn't a real pirate ship or even a real ship. It was just a rotted out rowboat, upside down, abandoned on the beach. Years ago, Ridley had cut a hole into the bottom of the boat for their mast, a wooden pole no wider in circumference than a child's wrist. A tattered black flag fluttered at the top. Davey had always loved her pirate stories best of all. She'd soon run out of the ones from her father's old books and had to make up new ones for him. They'd spent so many days searching for buried treasure. Sometimes Ridley would join in their games. He was just as fascinated by the idea of pirates as the boy.

Pearl sat down in the sand. She leaned against the pirate ship and tapped lightly on the side. "I came to say goodbye," she said. Davey didn't respond. She put her eye to a crack in the hull to look at him, huddled with his knees to his chest. He was almost too big to fit in the little dug out beneath the boat. "I understand if you don't want to come with us to the station."

"They'll take my picture," said Davey, faintly.

"Yes, they will," said Pearl. His mother shielded him from the public eye as best she could. She wanted him to grow up like any other kid. She wanted him to have the childhood which had been stolen from her and Finnick.

"Don't go," said Davey, unfurling his limbs. He crawled out on the other side of the boat and stumbled to her, almost collapsing in her lap. "Stay home. Tell them you're sick. You can't go."

Pearl laughed. She wanted to cry. "It's not that simple."

"It is," said Davey. "Ridley doesn't want you to go. Neither does mom. I heard them talking."

"You shouldn't eavesdrop."

Davey thrust out his dimpled chin. "No one tells me anything," he said, unapologetic. "I'm not a baby anymore, though. I can handle things."

"I know you can," said Pearl. "But this is-"

"You can't go!" said Davey. "It's not safe out there. I've got this bad feeling. If you go, you won't come back. My dad left and he didn't come back. That's what happens."

Pearl's heart split down the middle. She reached for him. He held stiff at first, but gradually sank into her. "That's not true," she said, stroking his hair. "I'm here now, aren't I? I came back once and I'll do it again. Nothing's going to happen to me. I won't be alone."

Davey pulled away suddenly. There was nothing childish about the way he looked at her. His eyes were emerald green, like his mother's, but they were so much clearer. They saw the things that Annie refused to see. "Commander Hawthorne was with my dad, too," he said, calmly, no sniffling, no tremors, not even blame. It was a fact.

"It's different this time."

"How?" demanded Davey.

Pearl sighed. To be honest, she wasn't sure. The tour was dangerous. She couldn't deny that. So many people were outraged with Paylor's government and, as a representative of that government, Pearl knew she was headed for shark-infested waters. Could she trust Gale to get her through?

The answer came at once, a bolt out of the blue. _Yes._ He saved people. He always had. It was simply his nature. She didn't know if she could trust him with her truth; she didn't doubt that she could trust him with her life.

"Everything's different," she said, looking at Davey, speaking to him as an adult. "I can't make you understand, because you weren't there before. Do you know what this tour is all about?"

"Unity," said Davey. Pearl smiled at him. Yes, he'd definitely been listening at keyholes.

"And do you know why it's so important to unite the Districts?"

Davey's face scrunched up in thought. He was stumped. "Not really," he admitted.

"Because if we don't, if we can't, then it all falls apart, everything your parents fought for. I know your scared." She reached out to him again, took his hand, and squeezed it tight. His fingers were still chubby with the last layer of baby fat yet to be shed. "I'm scared, too. I'm sure your dad was scared. That shouldn't stop us from fighting, from trying to…"

"Fix what's broken," Davey finished for her. He looked into her eyes for a minute and then nodded, giving his permission for her to leave again, and she was so proud of him right then. She saw the man he would be someday. A son worthy of his father. She saw Finnick's legacy shining through Annie's green eyes.

"Do you think Commander Hawthorne is scared?" said Davey.

"Absolutely terrified," Pearl answered without missing a beat.

"But the Mockingjay was never scared, was she?" he said.

Pearl's grip on his hand went slack for a moment. _Katniss,_ she thought, remembering her friend. "I think she was more scared than any of us." _I think she probably still is._ Though there was no way to know. The Mockingjay had not sung in a decade and she wasn't likely to ever again. She'd flown away. She wasn't coming back.

* * *

The train consisted of three passenger cars: the dormitory, the dining car, and a media center. As soon as he boarded, Gale claimed a room at the very end of the dormitory car and locked himself within. He pulled down the blinds, but that didn't keep out the bright flash of the photographers on the platform outside, so he covered his face with a pillow and didn't bother uncovering it when the train rolled away from the station.

He hadn't slept in over 48 hours and, in that time, had travelled some five hundred miles. The bolts holding the bed to the wall creaked under his weight. It didn't matter that the mattress was hardly more than a piece of cardboard. He was exhausted.,

The train began to rock as it gathered speed. Just as he was drifting off, he heard brusque footsteps moving along the corridor. They stopped at his door.

* * *

Pearl hesitated with her fist raised, about to knock, but then decided against it. There would be time to talk later. Plenty of time. She wasn't ready for his questions yet, so better to let him sleep, or sulk, or whatever else he was doing in there.

* * *

The footsteps continued. Gale was asleep by the time they reached the end of the corridor.

* * *

The moment Pearl entered the empty dining car, her eyes lit on the cappuccino machine with a stack of dainty white cups beside it. She was hesitant to take one. In her mind, she saw the whole stack toppling over, all the white cups shattered into pieces.

 _Don't be silly,_ she told herself. She was tired. Her mind had a tendency to play tricks on her and a cup of coffee was exactly what she needed to scorch away the worst-case scenarios racing across her thoughts. She took one of the cups. Nothing catastrophic happened. She hit the right buttons and a jet of cappuccino spat into her cup. The first sip was all foam.

Pearl settled down at the table and opened the info-pack on District 1. The train was due to arrive at 8AM. She glanced at her watch. That gave her ten hours to prepare.

"Not a problem," she said, yawning.

After another sip of coffee, she set to work.

* * *

Gale woke on the floor. He didn't remember falling off the bed, but he wasn't much surprised, considering it was more of a shelf. It was just past midnight. He'd slept longer than he meant to. Something popped in his lower back when he tried to sit and he couldn't move as he waited for the pain to subside. When had he gotten so old? His stomach gurgled pathetically, too weak to even muster up an indignant growl.

Out in the corridor, blue lights glowed softly along the floor to guide his way. He took out his flashlight anyway. It was always hooked to his belt, in case of blackouts back at the Nut, and though the added beam of light was unnecessary, it comforted him. He hated being stuck in the dark. It reminded him too much of the mine.

All of the lights were on in the dining car. The ambassador was fast asleep with her cheek resting on the table. Her arm dangled by her side. She was still clutching a pen in her hand. The way her bangs stirred every time she exhaled was hypnotizing. A few minutes passed before he remembered the flashlight was still on. He switched it off, but kept on watching her, though he knew it was rude, and weird, and if she woke up now, caught him, then he wouldn't know how to explain himself.

If she woke, he could ask his questions, only he still couldn't think of any. Whenever she wasn't around, he couldn't stop thinking of them, but then he was with her and they were all blasted them from his mind. She was here, she was alive, he accepted that, and yet it was still a shock somehow. She looked younger when she was sleeping, more like he remembered her, and he wished she could stay just as she was.

Only ghosts stayed the same forever, though, and she wasn't one of those anymore. She'd have to wake up eventually. Just not now, not quite yet.

* * *

Pearl didn't want to open her eyes. She was so warm and there was a smell, like pine trees and sunshine, the woods, home. She breathed deep instead of shying away from the familiarity. Her defenses were always at their lowest when she was caught in that between place of waking and dreaming. Usually she was confused. Usually she hurried the process along by zeroing in on her actual surroundings, but this time she lingered in the dream.

She was in the meadow, lying in the tall summer grass, listening to the mockingjays under a clear blue sky. If she opened her eyes, she would have to leave, so she never wanted to open her eyes.

* * *

The ambassador was awake. Gale could tell even though her eyes were still closed and she didn't stirr. He recognized the shift in her breathing. His first question spilled out of him, an accident. "Where are you?"

* * *

Pearl thought his voice was in her head, just another part of the fantasy. "The meadow," she said. As soon as she spoke aloud, the place in her mind blackened and curled at the edges like a burning photograph. She opened her eyes, not wanting to see that part of the dream, and there was Gale Hawthorne sitting across the table.

"I never go there," he said, speaking casually, as if commenting on the price of grain. Pearl didn't know how to respond. _How?_ she thought, staring at him, wondering if she was still asleep. How had he known she wasn't on the train? That she was somewhere else?

"Most of the time," he said, "I wake up in District 13. It's shit, you know, because it's underground like the Nut, so I can't always…" He stopped suddenly, turned his face to the window, and she realized he hadn't meant to say as much as he had. He'd probably never spoken as much to anyone else about the dreams.

"Find your way back," she said. "Yeah, I know."

Gale looked to her. After a moment, he nodded, before turning again to the window. They understood each other. Neither of them were always where they appeared to be.

In the silence, she noticed the info-pack was now on his side of the table. He must've pried it out from under her head. "Anything good in there?" she said. Her voice was too formal and stiff now. She cleared her throat and tried again. "Anything I should know?"

* * *

Gale shrugged. He doubted there was anything she didn't know already. "Have you been?" he said.

"To District 1? No."

He flipped a page of the info-pack without looking at it. Heavensbee was thorough. There was no denying that, at least. Gale wondered if the ambassador had gotten to the part about himself before she fell asleep. "I have," he said, grimacing. "They're not too fond of me."

"Well, I wouldn't think so," said Pearl. She knew, then. He heard it in her tone.

"You watched?" he said, risking a glance at her. She looked sympathetic and that was a thousand times worse than her disdain.

"Of course I watched," she said.

* * *

Pearl didn't remember much of the early days, after the rebellion. There wasn't much to remember. That whole first year was cocooned in thick fog. The only moments of clarity she recalled were of watching Gale. They had tried to make him the new face of Panem. She never missed a second of screentime. Hearing him, seeing him, knowing that he had survived, it was the only thing that had kept her from losing her mind completely.

So yes, she had watched him attack the mayor's wife on live television. She had also watched him make a public apology. Then nothing. He vanished from the public eye for a few years, until he became Paylor's right-hand man, and then his television appearances were always silent, just him standing solemnly beside the president.

"I'm sure you had a reason for what you did," she said.

* * *

Gale flipped another page of the info-pack, still not looking at it, still gazing out the window at the dark rushing by. He had a reason. He felt her waiting for him to give it up, but he couldn't. Doing so would mean talking about... _her._ The woman whose name he never spoke, not even in his own head.

"It doesn't matter," said Pearl. "Bygones are bygone. We have a job to do now."

Gale looked at her. She looked back, her blue gaze level, unflappable. "Right," he said, drawing himself up. He remembered the promise he'd made to Ridley at the train station. _I'll make sure she gets home. I'll keep her safe._ That was his job, his only concern. He wouldn't fail her this time. "Don't worry, Donner," he said, flashing a smile, "I've got this."

She didn't appear entirely convinced. He would just have to prove himself. "We'll be there in about an hour," he said, getting to his feet. He needed time alone, to brace himself, to prepare. Taking in her mussed up hair and the ink smudges on her cheek from where she'd fallen asleep on her notes, he thought it might be a good idea for her to do the same. "You might want to brush your hair," he said.

* * *

Pearl made a face at his back as he shuffled out of the dining car, but as soon as he was gone, she lifted her hand to her hair to assess the damage. As she did so, the jacket draped over her shoulders slithered to the floor. It was dark gray, military issue. She picked it up and caught a faint whiff of pine trees, sunshine, the woods.

She buried her nose in the coarse fabric, letting herself forgot for just a while longer. Letting herself go back, only a cautious step or two, so as not to lose herself in a dream.


	6. Weight of the World

"They count as quite forgot;

They are as men who have existed not;

There's is a loss past loss of fitful breath;

It is the second death."

-Thomas Hardy

Gale had never seen a hotel, let alone stayed in one. He knew what they were. Madge had tried to explain them to him once, but he couldn't grasp the concept of paying to sleep under someone else's roof.

"They used to have a lot of visitors from the Capitol," whispered Pearl. Her eyes swept across the empty lobby. "Guess not anymore."

He didn't question why she was whispering. They probably weren't as alone as they appeared to be. Their reception in District 1 couldn't have been any more different than the greeting they'd received in 4. No one had met them at the train station, except for the chauffeur who'd driven them to the hotel. As soon as they'd entered the lobby, a little man behind the desk scurried away, telling them he'd be back in a moment. _So much for a warm welcome,_ he thought as he inspected their surroundings.

The carpet was thick and crimson, almost squishy beneath his feet, like walking on styrofoam. Above, the ceiling was a glass dome, but the sun was hiding behind dark clouds and none of its light penetrated the lobby. They only had the dim light from the polished gold wall sconces. There was too much empty, open space. No furniture besides the long desk stretching from one end of the room to the other and a few plush chairs in small groupings.

Gale felt they'd been waiting a long time when a woman's voice floated to them from the top of the grand staircase, saying, "Oh, you're here!"

"Fuck," Pearl muttered under her breath. She spun to face the woman on the stairs with a dazzling smile plastered to her lips. Gale kept his back turned a moment longer, biting his lip, trying not to laugh. She used to blush whenever she cursed. He'd forgotten about that and, for once, remembering wasn't painful.

* * *

Pearl allowed the woman to kiss both her cheeks and managed not to flinch at the contact. It was a standard greeting between Capitolites which she didn't often tolerate. A kiss on the hand was bearable, never a kiss on the cheek. There was only one person for whom she made an exception.

"Surprise!" said Twyla. "I'm your media liaison!"

"Oh," said Pearl. _Oh,_ she thought, knowing she had to say more than that, but she wasn't sure whether the news was good or bad. With Twyla, there was the potential for either. "That's...grand."

"Isn't it?" said Twyla. "I've so missed working with you. I told Heavensbee he'd be crazy not to put us together again. There isn't a better team in all of Panem and it'd be utter rubbish to split us up."

Pearl nodded. She couldn't seem to gather her thoughts. There were too many and they were too swift to latch onto. Then Twyla glanced at Gale. Remembering him, having briefly forgotten that he was standing right beside her, Pearl pulled herself together. "I should introduce you," she said. "Twy, this is-"

"Commander Gale Hawthorne," said Twyla, offering her hand to Gale. "We've met."

* * *

Gale was certain he had never seen this woman before. She was a Capitolite, obviously. Her trilly bird-like voice was a dead give-away. Only she didn't look like a Capitolite. She had a mousy brown bob, her bangs pinned back by a simple, silver clasp, and her face was plain, doughy, no makeup. She wore a black suit tailored to hide her shape.

The Capitolite woman, Twyla, smiled at him. Her teeth sparkled like diamonds. Maybe they were diamonds.

"Oh dear, you don't remember me," she said. "I suppose my personal style has evolved quite a lot, so I'll forgive you."

"Thanks?" said Gale, glancing at Pearl. Her smile was still fake, but the laughter in her eyes was genuine. She was clearly enjoying his discomfort.

"I didn't forget you," said Twyla, stepping closer to him. "How could anyone forget that face?"

She cupped his cheek. Her palm was soft and slightly damp. Now he knew her. _Just look at those cheekbones. You can't buy those anywhere._ She wasn't speaking, but he heard her voice clear as a bell in his head. _They're going to eat you up in the Capitol._ This was the same woman who'd interviewed them during the Games. Another ghost.

"You need work," said Twyla, pursing her lips as her hand fell away from his face. "We only have a small team, but I think they're up to the challenge. A little grooming. A snip here, a snip there, and you'll be perfect."

When Gale looked at the ambassador this time, his eyes were narrowed. No one would be snipping him here nor there anytime soon.

* * *

The receptionist returned just in time. Pearl caught Gale by the arm and steered him away before he did something rash. He didn't resist, though she felt how tense his muscles were through the thin gray of his army jacket. "Not now, Twy," she said over her shoulder, "Let us get settled."

"I'll give you an hour," Twyla called after them. Her voice echoed through the empty lobby and followed them up the staircase. The receptionist, who had not spoken to them again, walked briskly ahead. Pearl let go of Gale's arm.

"Sorry," she whispered. "If I'd known they were sending her, I-"

"Later," muttered Gale. He quickened his pace, closing in on the receptionist, leaving her behind.

* * *

Gale listened at the door, waiting for the receptionist's footsteps to fade. He hadn't even looked at the room he'd been put in or turned on the lights. As soon as the coast was clear, he slipped back out into the hallway. The ambassador's room was directly across from his. He didn't bother knocking. The door was unlocked, so he entered.

The ambassador startled, banged her knee against the bedpost when she spun around, and grunted in pain. Perhaps he should've knocked. _Oops._ It didn't matter now. "Does she know you?" he blurted.

Pearl glared at him as she rubbed her knee. "We worked together in the Capitol," she said.

Gale matched her scowl. That wasn't what he meant and she knew. "No," she finally said, sighing.

"But-"

"She doesn't know anything," said Pearl, throwing up her hands.

* * *

Her knee was still throbbing. She sunk down onto the edge of the bed and covered her face with her hands while she pulled herself together. It was too hard to look at him and answer his questions at the same time. "I asked her once," she said, surfacing, "about the interviews, if she remembered…" She couldn't bring herself to speak her own name, because it didn't belong to her anymore. She couldn't bring herself to say _me_.

"Madge," Gale spoke for her. She winced.

Pearl stared at her knee, focusing on the pain. "Yes," she said, coldly, tightly. "She forgot the mayor even had a daughter."

For five years, Twyla had been sent to District 12 to oversee the interviews, and for five years the mayor's daughter had entertained her every whim, but she didn't remember. "Obviously she didn't forget you," said Pearl. Her lips curved into a bitter crescent smile. "Kind of hard to. You're a hero, after all."

* * *

She was pretending not to care. Gale knew that she did. Always forgotten, always lost. The girl with too many names and no name at all. Hearing her refer to him as a hero, he wanted to scream _I'm not_ so loud that all of Panem heard. Instead he half-whispered, "I didn't forget you."

Pearl looked at him and the screaming in his head stopped, drowned out by the blue of her eyes. Maybe it was instinct, or more of a habit, but he felt safe with her, despite everything, all the questions he didn't know the answers to, the decade of lost time between them, and how they'd ended. Their once alliance had gone deeper than either of them ever intended or anticipated.

"You know why you're here, right?" she said, snapping brusquely back to business. Gale took the hint. She'd given him all she was going to give for the moment.

"Well," he said, drawing out the word as he plucked at a loose thread at the cuff of his sleeve. "It's not just a security detail, is it?"

"Yes, but mostly no."

Gale crossed his arms and looked at her. "Heavensbee," he said flatly. He hated saying the man's name. It was like biting into an apple only to get a mouthful of worms.

"It was his idea," said Pearl, confirming his worst suspicion. He wasn't an idiot and he wasn't a teenager anymore. He knew better how the political game worked, even if he often chose to ignore his own understandings. That was the thing, though, about being around her. She had never allowed him to shy away from the truth and it seemed that, at least, had not changed. "You've been silent to the public for years," she continued. "He thought maybe-"

Gale held up his hands. He didn't need her to spell things out for him. Not anymore. "This is a Victory Tour," he said.

Pearl winced again and he knew he'd hit the right mark. He'd known, really, without wanting to, since Paylor gave him the position.

* * *

Pearl didn't blink. This was serious. This was _now_ , what mattered most. "We need the Mockingjay," she said. Gale's entire face crumpled. He seemed to shrink where he was standing, but she went on in the same cool manner, forcing herself to ignore his pain as well as her own. "But she's flown the coupe and, I'm sorry, you're the next best thing."

She thought he might faint, he was so pale, his face like a sheaf of parchment left in the sun to dry, bleached white, brittle. She waited for him to fall over, or fly into another rage, or maybe just run. When he did none of those things, she braved the leaden silence in a softer tone, "You won't be alone. You don't have to do it at all, if you can't."

* * *

Did she have any idea what she was asking of him? She knew what had happened the last time they tried to make him into a symbol. She had seen with her own eyes that he was incapable. More than that, he was disastrous, a liability. This was her arena, not his.

"Did you know?" he said, arms still crossed. "Don't lie. You promised."

"I guessed, like you," said Pearl. "No one told me. I was just as surprised as you, I swear, when Paylor announced you'd be coming along. I mean, I knew you were working at the Nut, but I didn't think I'd see you."

Gale believed her. He remembered that brief flicker of shock and terror when she'd first noticed him in Command.

"There will be more wars," she said. "More people will die if we can't bring the Districts together."

"So we use the Capitol's old tricks?" he said sharply, the bomb in his chest ticking. "We brainwash everyone into obedience."

"No," snapped Pearl. She took a deep breath as if to steady herself. "We remind them what we fought for and what we lost."

They stared at each other, a battle raging between them, static silence emanating from each of them as both a shield and a weapon. It was such a familiar energy, powerful and maddening, exhilarating, sickening. She believed in the tour. She never did anything halfway and that quality about her had only hardened over the years. When she believed in a cause, she gave herself entirely, becoming whoever she needed to be, sacrificing herself, even though her causes never seemed to work out. The rebellion had been a disappointment. So had he.

Yet he saw clearly that she hadn't given up on him. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, she believed in him. There was something else, too. The way she looked at him now, lurking beneath her mask of certainty, he saw that she was afraid of doing this alone.

 _I'll make sure she gets home,_ his own promise vibrated just beneath his skin, _I'll keep her safe._ He didn't believe in the tour, he had no hope for success, but it didn't matter. That wasn't why he was here and it wasn't why he'd agreed to come in the first place, suspecting all along that this was Heavensbee's true intent, to use him once again.

"Alright," he said, letting his arms drop. "I'll try."

Relief broke across the ambassador's face. For the first time since being thrown together again, she smiled at him as she once had, and he knew there was no going back. _I'm with you_ , he wanted to say. There was no need. That smile was proof enough that she understood.

* * *

Pearl was in agony trying to keep still while Twyla straightened out her curls, but as hard as she tried, she couldn't keep from fidgeting, and she had the burns on her neck as proof. She knew she should be preparing for tonight's festivities. With or without Gale's presence, negotiating with District 1 was not going to be an easy task. They had remained loyal to the Capitol during the rebellion and rejected Paylor's authority over them. At least such was the case for those in power and it was those people whom the new government needed to win over.

Panem was destitute. During the rebellion, plantations and orchards had been scorched, bridges and roads blown to bits, and then, of course, there were the mines. Most of the outlying Districts still relied on coal as their main source of energy. 12 had only begun producing coal again a couple years ago and there were still people living in blackout conditions. Yet the higher echelon of District 1 thrived. They had grown heinously rich, selling precious gems to the Capitolites, and it was Pearl's mission to somehow convince them to lend financial support to a government which they wanted no part of.

These were the matters which Pearl should've been considering, and she tried, but it was no more use than trying to sit still. Her mind turned again and again to Gale. Every road, every passing thought, lead to him. She worried over leaving alone with the stylists, prayed he had not murdered anyone in her absence, and more than once nearly leapt out of her chair to check on him. He had accepted Heavensbee's subterfuge almost too easily, resigned to the role they wanted him to play, and that unnerved her more than if he'd begun punching lamp posts again. It was not the Gale Hawthorne she knew.

 _Used to know,_ she reminded herself, twisting her hands in her lap. Had he really changed so much? She remembered when asking him to so much as smile for the cameras was like asking him to fling himself at an electrified fence and now, well, he was almost pliant. What had happened to her hard-headed, fiery hearted coal miner?

 _Not mine,_ she thought, _never mine._ Her chest ached, only a glimmer of what she'd once felt, all those years ago, after Katniss came home, watching him from a distance as he watched the girl he loved, the girl she wasn't, the girl on fire. They had all been burned. None of them were to blame, a realization that Pearl had come to far too late. The ache was something she had not felt in years. Oddly enough, a part of her almost missed the pain, terrible as it was, because everything that followed was so much worse.

"You're so pale," said Twyla, clucking her tongue in disapproval. She had finally finished with Pearl's hair, which now hung in a shimmering blonde sheet down her back, and was rifling through her cosmetic trunk. "You've been skipping meals again, haven't you?"

"Who has time to eat these days?" said Pearl. It was meant as a joke, but her voice was heavy. She sounded tired. That wouldn't do. Tonight, she would need to present District 1 with the illusion of strength. She was Paylor's representative and if she appeared weak, then so too would the president.

Twyla surfaced from the trunk with a blue jar in one hand, a brush in the other, and a frown. Sometimes Pearl forgot how much older Twyla was than her. She looked the same as she had ten years ago. Her face had been frozen in time by countless surgical procedures, but the thaw was slowly coming on. There were a few faint wrinkles starting to show around her mouth. Pearl didn't know how old she was exactly. Twyla, of course, refused to say.

"You'll kill yourself," said Twyla, seriously. She wasn't as flighty as she appeared on the surface. They had worked closely together in the Capitol for years now and Pearl had learned that she was a many faceted woman. She was like a gemstone, catching the light, throwing it back. Pearl had learned so much from her, how to interact with the Capitolites, how best to coerce them, and most importantly, how to protect herself by being everyone and no one, depending on the occasion.

"I'll rest when Panem does," said Pearl.

Twyla's frown deepened. "You're only one person," she said. "You can't heal everyone and everything."

Again, she was drawn back to Gale Hawthorne. _You can't be responsible for 8,000 people,_ he'd once told her, _that kind of pressure is going to kill you._ But she wasn't dead yet and there was more work to be done than ever before.


End file.
